The Sunshine Café
by Cutthroat Pixie
Summary: Spain/Romano: Lovino really hated his job. Coffee shop AU.


Title: The Sunshine Café  
Pairing/Characters: Spain/Romano  
Rating: PG-13  
Notes: Adel=Adelgonde=Belgium. I stole the name from a friend, she's fabu. Adel's brother=Netherlands. They're only mentioned in passing, though. Written for aph_fluffathon on LJ. The prompt was "A coffee shop AU with SpainxRomano."

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9:00 am. It was 9:00 am and Lovino was already wishing for the end of the day. Antonio's coffee shop (which was all Lovino ever referred to it as, especially when telling people where he worked, because the _Sunshine Café_ just sounded too fucking stupid for words) had been open for an hour, and the morning crowd was finally dying down a little. They didn't get quite as many customers as some of the larger chains, but it was still enough to drive Lovino up the wall.

Especially since the moron who _owned the shop_ still hadn't shown up yet (which was maybe Lovino's fault, he'd left that morning without waking him up, but Antonio should just learn how to wake up himself!) and Lovino had to deal with customer after customer all on his own.

He was going to put out a "Help Wanted" ad as soon as he got home, not matter how much Antonio insisted they didn't need it.

"Adel and her brother work here too, that's plenty!" he always said. "Though, I wouldn't oppose to hiring your cute little brother..."

As if Lovino would ever allow _that_ to happen.

"Lovi!" Speak of the devil. "Sorry I'm late!"

"About fucking time." Lovino passed a cup of coffee to a man across the register from him and then rushed off in the direction of the stockroom. "It's your turn to deal with this shit."

Sixteen, seventeen, eighteen...

Thirty-one, thirty-two, thirty-three...

Fifty-seven, fifty-eight...

"Lovi! Can you bring me more coffee filters, I'm all out in here!"

Fifty-seven, fifty-eight, fifty-

"Fuck," Lovino mumbled under his breath, realising he'd lost track of what he'd been counting when Antonio had called for him. Grumbling, he kicked at the boxes of new inventory he'd been attempting to keep track of. For the fifth time that day. "Come get them yourself, I'm busy!"

"Oh, it's okay, I'll just use some instant coffee instead!"

Lovino's eye twitched and he quickly grabbed a box of coffee filters, opened the door to the stock room, and threw the box at Antonio's head. "You stupid bastard you're going to- to- idiot us out of business, knock it off!"

"Lovi, watch your language around the customers!" Antonio scolded, pouting slightly and rubbing his head where the small cardboard box had hit him. "You're lucky they're getting used to it, that's the only reason we haven't been getting as many complaints lately."

That and Lovino had removed any written complaints out of the obnoxious, cutesy little turtle "piggy" bank Antonio used to collect comment slips in. But Antonio didn't need to know that.

"Just stop fucking bothering me."

The woman Antonio was serving gave Lovino an odd look and he turned back around to hide work in the stockroom once more, Antonio's cheery, "Have a nice day!" trailing behind him as he slammed the door.

Lovino really hated his job.

"I'll have a grande-"

"We only have small, medium, and large," Lovino dead-panned for what seemed like the billionth time that day. Whoever came up with all this "tall", "grande", "venti" shit really needed to be kicked in the shins.

"Whatever, you know what I mean."

"I don't. Get a small, medium, or large, or go somewhere el-"

"Eh, Lovi, maybe Boss should work the cash register, you make the drinks!"

Lovino stepped away from the cash register, more than a little thankful (a sentiment that the customer no doubt echoed). Didn't change the fact that he really, really hated his job still, though.

"Stop calling yourself 'Boss', it's stupid," he mumbled as he passed by Antonio.

"But you started it."

Lovino ignored the confused look on Antonio's face in favour of fiddling with the espresso maker. "I have no idea what you're talking about." Honestly, one stray, sarcastic, "Whatever you say, _Boss_," on his first day of work shouldn't have made Antonio think it was some cute nickname. Moron.

One might ask why Lovino continued working at Antonio's little coffee shop if he hated it so much. One might have their question answered with nothing but a glare and a string of curses, but really, it was because Lovino had pretty much just been handed the job and he was too lazy to find anything else to do. That, and Antonio was probably the only employer who would bother putting up with him.

He was also the only roommate who would bother putting up with him, but that was a completely different story altogether.

The point was, despite the fact that Lovino was entirely unsuited for customer service, and despite the fact that he was lazy and unmotivated and just sat around in the stock room pretending to be productive, Antonio still let Lovino keep his job and even though he hated it in all its entirety, a pay check was a pay check.

Though, seriously, he was really getting sick of listening to Antonio's cheerful, "Have a nice day!" all day long. He didn't know how that idiot could honestly sound like he meant it .time. At least his shift was ending soo-

"Oh, hey Lovi? Adel called in sick, can you stay a little later today? Please?"

"How big of a moron are you? She's the only other person working today!"

"So that's a yes? I know you don't have anything else planned for later~."

"Yeah, whatever, bastard, you better pay me for the extra hours this time."

Seriously. So much hatred.

Antonio had locked up the shop, flipped their cheery red and yellow OPEN sign to CLOSED, and was currently cleaning up all their equipment as Lovino stuffed a couple leftover pastries into his mouth.

"Ah, Lovino, you actually cleaned up a little, thanks!"

Had Antonio been anybody else, Lovino might have thought he was making fun of him, but Antonio was himself, so somehow, he was actually sincere in his excitement over Lovino "cleaning". Lovino looked at the now empty pastry box, mumbled a, "Don't say I never do anything for you, bastard" and wiped the last of the crumbs off his face.

"You missed one," Antonio said, leaning over to brush his thumb across Lovino's upper lip. "You're still just as messy as when we were kids, y'know~."

Lovino flushed bright red. With rage, obviously. "Sh-shut up, you jerk, stop touching me!" He slapped at Antonio's hand (which was already nowhere near his face), but the other man just laughed.

"I just need to lock up the stockroom and then we can leave!"

"I can leave whenever the fuck I want to," Lovino insisted, crossing his arms across his chest.

Again, Antonio just laughed. "Of course you can."


End file.
